Percussionist Bobby Torres isnât much on nostalgia. âTo me,â he says, âyouâre only as good as your last gig and itâs been 50 yearsâŚâ He trails off that final thought and shrugs.
The 76-year-old Latin jazz musician has had to reckon with the past a lot recently, searching it for memories from an August weekend in 1969 when he took the stage as part of Joe Cockerâs backing band at the Woodstock Music & Art Fair. He knows how important that moment was for both Cockerâs career and the many acts that took the stage at the festival 50 years ago, which is why heâs put together a tribute to the festivalâtitled Remembering Woodstock, with a Little Help from My Friendsâthat he and members of his Latin jazz ensemble will be performing tonight at Lan Su Chinese Garden.
But heâs the first to acknowledge that heâs put a lot of miles between himself and Max Yasgurâs farm, including a decade performing with Tom Jones, tours with Etta James, and sessions with Al Jarreau, Jackson Browne, and the band Mark Almond.
âItâs weird,â he says, soaking in the sun outside a coffee shop in Northeast Portland. âIâve been asked, âHow do you feel about being a part of history?â Before now, maybe 100 people knew about me playing with Joe Cocker.â
The number may be slightly higher than that, but not by much. Torresâ time with the Grease Band and Mad Dogs & Englishmen, the bluesy ensembles that backed up Cocker at Woodstock and beyond, lasted about two years. And you may catch a quick glimpse of him in Woodstock, the documentary film about the festival released in 1970, but he wasnât on stage with Cocker during the singerâs steaming performance of The Beatlesâ âWith a Little Help from My Friendsâ that made the final cut.
âI remember sitting in a screening room with Joe watching the movie,â Torres says, âand thinking to myself, âLook at that! Jesus!â I was freaking out inside that Iâm with this guy. Afterward, Joe says to me, âBobby, Iâm so sorry you werenât in the movie more,â and Iâm thinking, âWhat are you nuts? Are you crazy?â He was phenomenal.â
How Torres came to work with Cocker is already the stuff of legend. At the time, the percussionist was living in New York and studying at the RCA School of Electronics. A fan of Cockerâs work, he went to see the singer at the Fillmore East when he opened for Rod Stewart.
âI was already a fan of âFeeling Alright,ââ Torres says, referring to Cockerâs cover of the Traffic song that opened the singerâs 1969 debut album. âRock 'nâ roll conga! So, I go and see him and⌠no conga. He was playing another club that week, so I went and found him and asked if I could sit in for that one song.â
Torres kept that up for a few months when Cocker returned to headline the Fillmore East and then to play in Chicago before he was asked to join the band. From there, it was a whirlwind of gigs, TV appearances in the UK, and festival appearances, leading up to that momentous Sunday afternoon when he was shuttled on a decommissioned Army helicopter to the backstage at Woodstock, a short journey that was as memorable as playing in front of a sea of people.
âIt was us and Sha Na Na,â Torres remembers. â[Grease Band keyboardist] Chris Stainton had taken some acid earlier and he said, âOh, I feel a bit sick.â He crawled on his stomach over to the big porthole in the side of the helicopter and threw up as we were passing over the crowd. He got back up and said, âOh, I feel better.ââ
What he mostly remembers from the performance was the feeling of hearing a few hundred thousand people roaring in approval. And that, when the set was over, a thunderstorm rolled in (âIt was like God was applauding usâ) that kept he and the band stuck at the festival for a while. Beyond that, Torres has logged that experience alongside thousands of other gigs heâs played in the five decades since.
âIt was a big deal, but at the same time,â he says, âit was getting written up in the paper, and two weeks later, thatâs lining the bird cage.â
What Torres will cop to, at the very least, is how much heâs grown as a performer and a player since he took that momentous leap of faith in asking to sit in with Cocker five decades ago.
âAt that time, it was persistence and fearlessness,â he says. âI got rejected a lot of times, but I kept on going. I donât know if I was incompetent or just dumb. Iâve learned so much from then to now. I canât believe how much Iâve learned⌠'cause I didnât know shit at the beginning.â
Bobby Torres Ensemble: Remembering Woodstock, With a Little Help from My Friends, Tues Aug 20, 7:30 pm, Lan Su Chinese Garden, 239 NW Everett, $30-45